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US grudgingly acknowledges Chavez role on hostages
Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
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U.S. grudgingly acknowledges Chavez role on hostages (Reuters)
The Guardian - Jan 11, 2008
http://www.guardian.co.uk/colombia/story/0,,2238975,00.html
Ch!vez wins freedom for Colombian hostages
Rebels release pair in deal with Venezuelan president
Mother will meet son born in jungle captivity
by Rory Carroll in Caracas and Sibylla Brodzinsky in Bogot!
Venezuelan Red Cross helicopters plucked two high-profile Colombian
hostages from the jungle yesterday, ending their six-year kidnap ordeal
and raising hopes for other hostages. A day of drama ended in
breakthrough after Clara Rojas, a former Colombian vice-presidential
candidate, and Consuelo Gonz!lez, a former member of the country's
congress, were retrieved from a remote region in eastern Colombia, in a
deal brokered by Venezuela's president, Hugo Ch!vez.
The freed captives were being flown to the Venezuelan capital, Caracas,
last night. An earlier deal to release them in December broke down.
"I told them 'Welcome to life, welcome to life'," Ch!vez told
journalists shortly after speaking to the former hostages by telephone.
They were emotional and in good health, he said.
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, Farc, agreed to the
handover after months of mediation by Ch!vez, a process which verged on
fiasco and triggered furious rows between Venezuela's leader and
Colombia's government.
On Wednesday the rebels notified Ch!vez, a fellow leftwinger whom they
respect, that they would release the women in the south-eastern state
of Guaviare bordering Venezuela. Colombia's armed forces agreed to
tem****arily suspend operations as the Red Cross helicopters flew to the
rendezvous yesterday.
"It still seems like I'm kind of dreaming," said Rojas's elderly
mother, Clara Gonz!lez de Rojas. "This is the biggest miracle my God
could have ever given me. I'll be truly happy when I go with my
daughter to retrieve my little grandson."
Rojas, 44, was running mate to the presidential candidate Ingrid
Betancourt when the two were kidnapped in February 2002. She gave birth
to a baby boy named Emmanuel in 2004, re****tedly after a liaison with
one of her captors.
Mother and son, as well as Consuelo Gonz!lez, 57, who was abducted in
September 2001, were due to be freed in late December. The deal
collapsed when it emerged that the rebels did not have the boy. He had
somehow been passed into the government's foster care system while he
was still an infant and had been living in the capital, Bogot!.
That revelation shook the rebels' credibility and embarrassed Ch!vez's
elaborate reception committee, which included the film director Oliver
Stone. Colombia's president, Alvaro Uribe, a conservative and unbending
foe of the rebels, said it proved that Farc could not be trusted.
Yesterday's releases, conducted under the Red Cross aegis and without a
media circus, should mend some fences between the two governments, said
Michael ****fter, of the Inter-American Dialogue thinktank. "Uribe
should get some credit for having successfully embarrassed Farc over
the Emmanuele incident, and also for accommodating Ch!vez's efforts to
secure the release. Chavez will save face and regain some standing as a
leader committed to regional peace."
For the relatives of the two freed hostages waiting in a Caracas hotel
the political wrangling was a sideshow to their joy and relief. All
were expected to fly home to Bogot! later this week, where Rojas would
be reunited with her son.
For the families of the other 750 hostages it was a bittersweet day,
which intensified their longing. Many are being held for financial
ransom, while 46 high-profile captives, including Betancourt and three
US defence contractors, are being kept as political bargaining chips.
"This has to be the beginning of an effort that culminates with the
release of all the "exchangeable" hostages and all the kidnap victims
held for ransom," said a Colombian senator, Piedad Cordoba, who acted
as a facilitator for Ch!vez.
Yesterday's breakthrough will renew pressure on Colombia's government
to make concessions to secure other releases, said Rom!n Ortiz, a
security analyst in Bogot!. The fact that the rebels dropped their
precondition for a demilitarised zone as a precursor to negotiations -
a previous sticking point - put the ball in their court, he said. "They
have to decide what they will demand now."
***
Reuters - Jan 10, 2008
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsMaps/idUSN1010923420080110
U.S. grudgingly acknowledges Chavez role on hostages
WA****NGTON (Reuters) - The United States grudgingly acknowledged
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's role in freeing two women hostages
in Colombia on Thursday but made clear it was not about to ask his help
to free three Americans there.
U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey warmly welcomed the release
of the two women held for years in Colombia's jungles by Marxist rebels
but avoided praising the leftist Chavez, an outspoken critic of the
United States who has described U.S. President George W. Bush as the
devil.
"We welcome the release of these two hostages," Casey told re****ters of
former Colombian vice-presidential candidate Clara Rojas and
ex-congresswoman Consuelo Gonzalez, who were being flown to freedom on
helicopters Chavez sent to pick them up.
"We are also appreciative of the leader****p of (Colombian) President
(Alvaro) Uribe, in terms of trying to secure the release of these
hostages, and we welcome the good offices of any individuals who can
help secure that, in cooperation with the Colombian government," he
said.
He also called on the FARC, a peasant army created in the 1960s and now
largely funded by Colombia's cocaine trade, to release all its
hostages, who include former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid
Betancourt, who was kidnapped in 2002, and three U.S. anti-drug
contractors captured in 2003.
Casey praised the efforts of Uribe in securing the release of the two
women and said the United States would continue to work with his
government on freeing the others. He largely avoided mentioning Chavez.
"I think that anybody, including President Chavez ... who has a role to
play that is positive and that sup****ts President Uribe and the
Colombian government's efforts is to be welcomed," Casey said.
Asked if Wa****ngton was willing to work with Chavez to try to release
the U.S. hostages, Casey replied: "Well, we continue to work with the
government of Colombia. The government of Colombia and President Uribe
are the ones who are ultimately responsible for managing whatever
process is involved here."
He added that the United States would do "anything and everything" it
could to secure the release of its hostages but would not directly
address whether this might include talking to Chavez.
(Writing by Arshad Mohammed, editing by Cynthia Osterman)
(c) Reuters 2007. All rights reserve
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